Chapter 704 – Day 80 – Ceres Wakes Up From a Long, Long Sleep.
Ceres never once thought that she could be saved.
The evil deeds she committed were truly terrifying even to her own sense, even if no one else saw her.
Ceres has lived a long life beyond what the princess knows. For a long time, she lived with many faces on earth, and wherever she passed, there was chaos that no one could handle.
In order to somehow atone for that, she tried to share even a little bit of what she knew, even a fragment of her wisdom, with the humans on earth, but the curse her mother engraved was beyond her imagination.
Therefore, Ceres never once thought that she would have a happy ending.
If there is a happy future, wouldn’t it be to have her head cut off in the arms of her beloved princess?
Even when Jupiter’s sharp spear pierced her heart, she truly shed tears and felt joy, saying, “Ah, this kind of death isn’t that bad.”
“Ah… Ha.”
Ceres, whose death was postponed forever, felt the pain of being closer to her death forever.
When on earth did the pain suddenly end? Ceres lifted her upper body, holding her throbbing head with both hands, as her last memory was to look helplessly at the ceiling shimmering with white light.
“Cough… What is this…”
Ceres coughed lightly and touched her cleavage with her right hand. Even if Ceres himself had healed himself with some kind of magic that even he couldn’t imagine, his scars would definitely remain…
Feeling that his skin was as smooth as usual, Ceres was startled and gently pressed the area where his heart was with his index finger to smooth it out.
‘I see… I’m dead…’
This will be the afterlife. Ceres immediately thought so. In fact, it was a very common sense inference.
Ceres lost her heart to Jupiter’s attack. He delayed his death with healing magic, albeit briefly, and was able to communicate with the princess.
The phenomenon that can be explained by the word ‘miracle’ ends there. She was a princess who used a dagger to stop time, saying she would save herself, but in this world and on this earth, there is no such thing as a cure for a ‘torn heart’.
“… Ha, ha ha…”
Ceres exhales awkwardly and touches her left hand. There was a small bracelet emitting pure white light. Ceres remembered healing Hedone with the power of this bracelet, but it was impossible for the princess to wear this bracelet.
It’s impossible. Although Queen Madolce left somewhere in her room the method of completely repairing the artifacts she found underground, time travel was like a dream that even Ceres thought it would be possible.
“…”
The afterlife is such a quiet place. When Ceres thought that, he couldn’t even burst out laughing.
Her crying and rising regrets were not something she could endure, even if she was always living with her actions with an adult expression.
─Kkii Iik
As depression filled my mind, I heard the sound of a wooden door opening. Ceres swallowed his saliva and looked cautiously toward the door.
“I hope you had a good dream! Ceres.”
“Venus… Princess…?”
Ceres, who had obviously thought that he was dead and that this was the afterlife, blinked.
Funny enough, she instinctively grabbed the blanket that was covering her lower body and roughly pulled it over her, quickly covering her upper body.
“Haha! You’re so shocked, like you’ve seen a ghost!”
The princess smiled brightly, and her hair was sparkling with the beautiful sunlight, as if Ceres had always touched it.
“Woah, the princess too… Lord, are you a dead god?”
At the words of Ceres, who had a blank expression, the princess opened her eyes and burst out laughing.
“Ha, haha…! Ha, haha!!! Ceres! You are now… Kkkk… Do you think this is a world where messengers arrive?”
“H-Hah, Princess Haona… Oh, that doesn’t make sense…”
Ceres hastily covers herself a little more and looks at the bracelets around her arms.
The situation was so different from Hedone that it was impossible to make her own heart whole with this bracelet. Although the technology was there, the power was lacking. Ceres knew better than the princess that the technology needed to create something a little more complicated than this was needed.
There was even no trace of the bracelet being used, and who else, but Ceres would have used this bracelet in the first place?
“My heart… How?”
“Hmm, that would be quite a long story. But the point is that I faithfully followed the path you left for me.”
“Ho, by any chance… Queen Madolche’s relics…”
“Yes, by applying that artifact, Arisa used magic that allowed her to travel through time.”
After hearing the story, Ceres blinked his eyes and smiled awkwardly.
“Just kidding…”
“I am not joking, Ceres. I am a horse.”
The princess held Ceres’ hand tightly and made him look at her and smiled.
“It was a really long adventure to save you. It felt like it took about 100 days.”
“Princess Venus… But… But…”
Ceres, bursting into tears, smiles bitterly.
“I… The woman called me… Is worth saving so much that the princess endures such pain and suffering, and she goes on a painful journey…”
“Stop saying strange things, Ceres! Aren’t you the person I love?”
Ceres bites his lips tightly.
“Also… Didn’t I tell you it was okay?”
“It’s not okay at all! Princess Venus… Don’t you know? I’m a demon. A demon. Just like the princess… We’re born with a destiny to kill each other. So. So…”
“What does it matter that you are a demon? Even if you were a human or an elf, you are Ceres, the Ceres I love.”
The princess strongly grabbed her hand and pulled her to look at her, her eyes shining.
“I am. I learned something very valuable during this trip.”
“Princess Venus…”
“Demons are. In the end, they are no different from humans. The only thing they end up with is a tail and horns. If that’s all, isn’t it really foolish for us to fight forever to destroy each other? ?”
Ceres swallowed his saliva and lowered his head.
“Is your heart heavy because of the sins you have committed?”
The situation was very different from the situation where I thought I could atone for that sin through death.
“Yes… Princess. My sin… Is a sin that I can never atone for while living.”
“Isn’t it rather the opposite? I believe it is a sin that cannot be atoned for by your death.”
“Yes…?”
The princess gently pulled Ceres’ trembling hand and guided it to her chest.
“It may be because of her mother’s curse, but with your hand and sickle, you used magic to cause chaos to countless people.”
“Ah…”
“It’s probably been a while since you killed them yourself. There must be as many people as mountains and rivers fighting because of the chaos you caused. If you die to atone for those people… Do you know what will happen?”
“… I don’t know.”
“This world will continue in the same way you ruined it. The chaos you created will remain, and the sorrow you created will never be healed by anyone, and if you die, that will really be atonement. Is it a thing?”
Ceres looked at her princess with surprised eyes.
“Princess… But, the path you are thinking about right now is…”
“Ah, it must be a very thorny path. I feel like countless nobles in the empire may already be pointing fingers at me for not killing you. Haha!”
The princess smiled pleasantly.
“But, isn’t there nothing you can gain if you don’t work hard? I, who can travel through time, can’t just be with you? There’s nothing I can’t do to fight against the old nobles who push their fat asses into the Imperial Assembly and act out their ridiculous behavior. Don’t you?”
Hehe… You’re going to have a really hard time, Princess. Really… Really, the whole world is going to point and curse at you for being unreasonable in embracing a sinful woman like me.”
Ceres, who made her smile even through her tears, grabbed the princess’s waist.
The two gently pulled each other’s bodies into a hug, and Ceres let out her warm breath, burying her face in the back of the princess’s neck and letting out a warm, happy breath.
“You’re going to have a hard time. I’m sure.”
“If it’s a hardship, I plan on doing it forever, so don’t even think about running away.”
“Hehe, hehe… Where would I dare go, leaving behind the princess who loved me so much that she created an unbelievable miracle?”
Ceres let out a happy laugh and carefully grabbed the princess’s cheek, slightly raising her body, and rubbing their mouths against each other.
After continuing the short, deep kiss with a small snort, Ceres slowly pulled away from the princess’s face and swallowed her saliva.
“But princess…? How on earth did you treat me? Was there some magic I didn’t know about? No matter how much human magic followed that of the demons…”
“Oh? Haha, what are you talking about? Of course, I used a little of the ancient demon’s power to heal you.”
“Oh, ancient demons?”
Ceres tilts his head at the unexpected answer.
“Um, yes. First… I used the power of the medical facility hidden in this imperial palace. There is an AI called ‘Isis’. I gave orders to that thing and treated you. Ah, And, you know, there is a functioning foot somewhere in the imperial palace—”
“Um… Princess…? What are you talking about? I-Isis…? AI…?”
The princess, who was excitedly spewing out knowledge and wisdom, had her eyebrows fluttering as Ceres looked extremely dumbfounded.
“Ceres, can’t you… Do you not understand me…?!”
